After watching the movie Knowing (horrible BTW, don’t watch it) I was curious about the real science of solar flares. Stumbled across this and felt it was worth sharing.
Just before dawn the next day, skies all over planet Earth erupted in red, green, and purple auroras so brilliant that newspapers could be read as easily as in daylight. Indeed, stunning auroras pulsated even at near tropical latitudes over Cuba, the Bahamas, Jamaica, El Salvador, and Hawaii.
Even more disconcerting, telegraph systems worldwide went haywire. Spark discharges shocked telegraph operators and set the telegraph paper on fire. Even when telegraphers disconnected the batteries powering the lines, aurora-induced electric currents in the wires still allowed messages to be transmitted.
I know its not as notable, but about five or six years ago, there was probably THE MOST phenomenal aurora in the sky i have ever seen. Literally, it was like the sky was water and someone dumped bright red dye in it. It was these beams of light filtering down as the gases in the atmosphere were ignited. Covered the whole sky from horizon too horizon. Absolutely incredible, best part is i see auroras about once a week out here in the country
Where the heck are you? I’m out the sticks and I’ve only seen an aurora once. It was about 5 years ago and was very intense.
It’s interesting that the article mentions aurora’s messing up telegraph equipment. My grandfather was a telegrapher for the railroad. I remember him telling stories about how every once in a great while there’d be an aurora that would bring telegraph communication and the entire railroad to a screeching halt. He said the telegraph would go “haywire.” I guess it would randomly do whatever it wanted and there was no way to make it stop or transmit a message. That had to be very disconcerting considering that was the only means of communication.
I remember this. It started in one point in the sky and then stretched out as far as you could see illuminating what would appear to be the lines of longitude. As if the sky were slices of an orange. It was awesome.
Does anyone have pictures of this or know where to find them I dont know what the phenomena was called